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A combined U.S.-Russian special forces operation captures General Alexander Radek, the dictator of Kazakhstan. Three weeks later, U.S. President James Marshall attends a diplomatic dinner in Moscow, Russia, during which he praises the capture and insists the U.S will no longer negotiate with terrorists. Marshall and his entourage, including his wife Grace and 12-year-old daughter Alice, and several of his Cabinet and advisers, prepare to return to the U.S. on Air Force One. In addition, members of the press have been invited aboard, including Radek loyalists disguised as journalists led by Ivan Korshunov.

After takeoff, Secret Service agent Gibbs, who is a mole, enables Korshunov and his accomplices to obtain weapons and storm the plane, killing many of the other agents and military personnel before taking the civilians hostage. Marshall is raced to an escape pod in the cargo hold and seemingly escapes as the pod is ejected. The pilots, Colonel Axelrod and Lieutenant Colonel Ingraham, attempt an emergency landing at Ramstein Air Base in Germany, but Korshunov and his second-in-command & pilot, Andrei Kolchak breach the cockpit and kill the pilots, diverting the plane towards Kazakhstan. Several F-15s escort Air Force One as it is piloted towards Radek-loyal airspace.

Unknown to Korshunov, Marshall, a veteran of the Vietnam War and a Medal of Honor recipient, has remained hidden in the cargo hold instead of using the pod, and begins to observe the mercenaries using his military training. Marshall manages to kill some of Korshunov's men and then uses a satellite phone to make contact with his Vice President Kathryn Bennett at the White House in Washington, D.C.. Korshunov, believing that a Secret Service Agent is stowed away in the cargo hold, secures Grace and Alice separately from the other hostages, and executes National Security Advisor Jack Doherty and Deputy Press Secretary Melanie Mitchell, contacting Bennett and demanding Radek's release. Marshall dumps some of the plane's fuel reserve in an attempt to force a landing. Korshunov demands a mid-air refueling, while Marshall gains access to the conference room where the hostages are being held and he, along with his military advisers, devise a plan to trick Korshunov to take Air Force One to a lower altitude for the refueling, giving time for the hostages to parachute safely off the plane. As a KC-10 tanker docks with Air Force One, Marshall and the advisors escort the hostages to the cargo hold, where most parachute away. However, Korshunov discovers the deception and forces Air Force One away, causing the fuel to ignite, destroying the tanker.

Capturing Marshall, Chief of Staff Lloyd Shepherd, Major Norman Caldwell, and Gibbs, Korshunov forces Marshall to contact Russian President Petrov and arrange for Radek's release from prison. Bennett is urged by Defense Secretary Walter Dean to declare the President incapable under the 25th amendment, so as to override Radek's release, but she refuses. While Korshunov and his men celebrate the news of Radek's release, Marshall breaks free, and kills Korshunov's remaining henchmen. Korshunov tries to kill Marshall, but Shepherd jumps into the path of the loyalist's bullet, saving the President's life. Korshunov drags Grace down to the cargo hold, and to the plane's parachute ramp. Marshall gives chase and Grace briefly distracts Korshunov, before Marshall strangles Korshunov with a parachute strap before throwing him off the plane. Marshall races back to lift his order, and Radek is subsequently killed attempting to flee custody.

Marshall, with Caldwell's help, directs the plane back towards friendly airspace, only to be quickly tailed by a second batch of Radek loyalists piloting MiG-29s. The F-15s counterattack the MiGs, but Air Force One sustains heavy damage; one MiG ruptures Air Force One's fuel tanks, causing the plane to lose fuel, and when one F-15 pilot sacrifices himself to intercept a missile, shrapnel from the resulting explosion damages Air Force One's tail controls, rendering landing impossible. A standby USAF Rescue HC-130 is called to help, sending para-jumpers on tether lines to help rescue the survivors. Marshall insists that his family and the injured Shepherd be transferred first. When there is time for only one more transfer, Gibbs reveals his true intentions, killing Caldwell and the para-jumper. Marshall and Gibbs fight for control of the transfer line, and Marshall manages to grab and detach it at the last second. Air Force One crashes into the Caspian Sea, killing Gibbs. The HC-130 airmen reel Marshall in safely, where he walks into his family's waiting arms. Everyone in the White House Situation Room celebrate as confirmation of Marshall’s rescue is given, and Bennett tears up the presidential incapacity order. The HC-130 is subsequently dubbed with the call sign of Air Force One as it flies safely away.

Harrison Ford as U.S. President James Marshall: Popular president and a family man who loves his wife Grace and daughter Alice. Marshall is also a decorated Vietnam veteran and Medal of Honor recipient who speaks reasonably fluent Russian. Feigning escape during Air Force One's hijacking, he attempts to retake the aircraft, to rescue everybody.

Gary Oldman as Ivan Korshunov: A Russian Radek loyalist who leads the hijacking of Air Force One. Korshunov believes that the collapse of the Soviet Union had ruined his country.

Glenn Close as U.S. Vice President Kathryn Bennett: The Vice President of the United States who commands the situation in the White House Situation Room, alongside Secretary of Defense Walter Dean and Chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff General Northwood. Though all the tension, Bennett remains calm and collected, refusing to make risky or poor decisions.

Ilia Volok as Vladimir Krasin, Korshunov's muscle hijacker and close friend, as they both fought the Afghans together.

Xander Berkeley as U.S. Secret Service Special Agent Gibbs, in charge of Presidential Protective Division. A mole who secretly helps the terrorists take over Air Force One. The hijackers never reveal to anyone Gibbs' true intentions, to the point where they also hold him hostage along with everyone else.

Jürgen Prochnow as General Alexander Radek: The dictator of a rogue terrorist regime in Kazakhstan that had taken possession of former stolen Sovietnuclear weapons, threatening to start a new Cold War, Radek's regime is responsible for the killing of 200,000 people. Captured by a joint Russian-American military ops team, Radek is imprisoned in Russia, awaiting trial for his crimes against humanity. The terrorists who take over Air Force One, demand for Radek to be released, threatening to kill a hostage every half hour.

Donna Bullock as Deputy Press Secretary Melanie Mitchell: Korshunov, believing that a Secret Service Agent is in the cargo hold, executes her.

Michael Ray Miller as Colonel Axelrod, USAF, pilot of Air Force One: Axelrod bravely attempts to make an emergency landing after the hijacking begins. He orders the flight crew, "No matter what happens, we land this aircraft, is that understood?"

Carl Weintraub as Lieutenant Colonel Ingraham, USAF, co-pilot of Air Force One: Ingraham courageously attempts to help Axelrod emergency land the plane after the hijacking begins.

A large part of the crew took a tour of the real Air Force One before filming. They based some of the film's scenes on the touring experience in which the terrorists disguised as journalists survey the plane's layout and begin to take their seats. The character of Deputy Press Secretary Melanie Mitchell was based largely on their real-life tour guide, and the crew felt uncomfortable having to film the character's execution by the terrorists.[2]

Paul Attanasio was brought in as a script doctor to work on the film prior to shooting.[8] Scenes explaining Agent Gibbs' motivation for being the mole were cut from the final script. According to director Wolfgang Petersen, Gibbs was a former CIA agent who lost a lot after the end of the Cold War and thus became angry with the American government and wanted revenge. He knew the terrorists from his CIA days and so they included him in their operation. The scene was considered too long to tell and so it was cut from the film. The director also felt that it was unnecessary to have in the film so it was removed as it was irrelevant to the plot. Petersen also said that in the original draft, Gibbs revealed himself as the mole early and joined the terrorists in hijacking the plane. The director felt it was more suspenseful to keep the audience guessing in the final cut and specifically pointed to the scene in which Marshall gives Gibbs a gun before escorting the hostages from the conference room to the parachutes in the cargo hold.[2]

Gary Oldman did not stay in character between the scenes. The director later said he called the filming experience "Air Force Fun" because of how comic and genial Oldman would be off-screen. He also said that Oldman would suddenly return to the menacing film persona like a shot.[2]

On Rotten Tomatoes, Air Force One has an approval rating of 76%, based on 55 reviews, with an average score of 6.99/10. The site's critical consensus reads, "This late-period Harrison Ford actioner is full of palpable, if not entirely seamless, thrills."[10] On Metacritic, the film has a weighted average score of 61 out of 100, based on 25 critics, indicating "generally favorable reviews".[11] Audiences polled by CinemaScore gave the film an average grade of "A" on an A+ to F scale.[12]

Peter Travers of Rolling Stone awarded the film 3.5/4 stars, describing it as "superior escapism", and concluding, "Air Force One doesn't insult the audience. It is crafted by a film-maker who takes pride in the thrills and sly fun he packs into every frame. Welcome to something rare in a summer of crass commercialism: a class act."[13]Todd McCarthy of Variety described the film as "a preposterously pulpy but quite entertaining suspense meller" that is "spiked by some spectacularly staged and genuinely tense action sequences." He lauded the film's antagonist: "[Gary] Oldman, in his second malevolent lead of the summer, after The Fifth Element, registers strongly as a veteran of the Afghan campaign pushed to desperate lengths to newly ennoble his country."[14]

In a mixed review, Roger Ebert of the Chicago Sun-Times gave the film 2.5 stars out of 4 and found it flawed and cliché-ridden yet "well-served by the quality of the performances ... Air Force One is a fairly competent recycling of familiar ingredients, given an additional interest because of Harrison Ford's personal appeal."[15] Adam Mars-Jones of The Independent was more critical, calling it "so preposterous that it begins to seem like a science-fiction artifact...the product of a parallel-universe 1990s which somehow by-passed the decades since the 1950s."[16]

President Bill Clinton saw the film twice while in office and gave it good reviews. He noted, that certain elements of the film's version of Air Force One, such as the escape pod and the rear parachute ramp, did not reflect features of the actual Air Force One (though since many Air Force One features are highly classified and "need-to-know", these features cannot be completely ruled out).[17] In the audio commentary, Wolfgang Petersen mused that although the real plane did not have those features at the time of the filming, they would probably be added by future governments.[citation needed]

One of the most popular action films of the 1990s, Air Force One earned $172,650,002 (54.9%) domestically and $142,200,000 (45.1%) in other countries.[23] It grossed a total of $315,156,409 worldwide in the box office.[24] It was the year's fifth highest-grossing film worldwide.[25]

Randy Newman was initially hired to write the film score; however, Petersen considered his composition to be almost a parody and commissioned Jerry Goldsmith to write and record a more somber and patriotic score in just twelve days, with assistance from Joel McNeely.[31][32] After the harrowing experience, Goldsmith vowed never again to take on such a last-minute task.[33]
Newman used some of his material from the rejected score in Toy Story 3.[34]

The music label Varèse Sarabande released a soundtrack album featuring Goldsmith's music. McNeely receives a credit on the back cover for "Additional Music in the Motion Picture", but none of his work is on the CD, although his cues include the material heard when Air Force One is under attack.[33][original research?]

A novelization of the film was published in June 1997 by author Max Allan Collins. Although the book has the same central plot and outcomes as the film, its main storyline has additional scenes and lines not in the film. The book develops characters more than the film. Marshall is described as possessing a smile that is described in the novel as "the most valuable weapon in his public relations arsenal" (p. 11). He promotes an interventionist line on foreign policy and a strong stance against terrorism (met with political opposition from opposition Speaker of the House, Franklin Danforth, in the novel). He is described as a first-term President, up for re-election later on in the year that the film is set in. In the third year of his presidency in the novel, Marshall's home state is Iowa. A two-term former governor of Iowa in the novel, he first campaigns in the film for the US House.

Marshall is described in the novel as "a moderate-Republican version of Bill Clinton, minus the womanizing reputation, and without a hint of personal or professional scandal" (p. 99–100). Korushunov's family is expanded upon, and it is revealed that Korushunov is not his real name. Unlike the movie, Gibbs's identity as the traitor is not revealed until the end of the book. It also hints at his motivation: "What he did remember, as he sipped his coffee, was that he knew these men, had worked with these men, and it was a damn shame they had to die so that he could be wealthy." Korushunov later tells Marshall he "paid" him off. It also presents a slightly alternative ending: in the novel, Air Force One crashes in the Russian countryside, but in the film, it crashes into the Caspian Sea.[38]